Lost in Heaven
by anonymous-lemonade
Summary: My take on that fateful day when Jasper met Alice.


**Title**: Lost In Heaven  
**Rating**: Teen (about the same as the books)  
**Pairings**: Alice/Jasper  
**Genre**: General?  
**Word Count**: 2,185  
**Summary**: My take on how Jasper and Alice met.  
**Author's Notes**: Forgive me if my Jasper is a bit different from what most people perceive him to be. My interpretation of Jasper is a bit more... interesting. Well, to me at least. I hope that you won't be frazzled by his personality traits. Other than that though, please enjoy.  
**Disclaimer**: Twilight belongs to Stephenie Meyer. I don't own... so you don't sue.

* * *

"_The clouds, the source of rain, one stormy night offered an opening to the source of dew; which I accepted with impatient sight, looking for my old sky-marks in the blue._" Jasper Whitlock was not nearly as unsettled by the fact that he had been walking aimlessly for over twenty years with only one direction as his immediate goal: East. The possibility that tomorrow were to bring yet another onslaught of thirst was not something that he particularly looked forward to during the long, cold night. Then again, one of the many things that he was thankful for was that he did not dream anymore. He vaguely remembers his most gruesome of nightmares during his feeble days as a mortal nowadays and yet he almost wishes he did not. His nightmares from long ago now seem so tame against the backdrop of his bloodshod eyes. War wrought was his soulless form as it still continued to march to a silent drum roll; as if he were walking towards his death and yet death was not granting him such a relief. Every once in awhile Jasper would unconsciously stop and shout to the impassive moon while craze and anguish ripped his insides. These bouts of hysteria came mostly after he fed; damn humans and their... emotions. They radiated off of them like really bad body odor. The kind that could drive you insane with guilt and disgust with yourself. How long had it been since the last time that he's even looked at himself in a mirror? But what did he expect to see? Certainly he would see the same thing that he saw fifty years before from the small mirror in Maria's room; the same face, the same scares that marred his diamond hard skin, the same scarlet, red orbs.

Jasper did not often contemplate where he was going; simply walking a road until it ended and then starting to walk again, creating his own path through unchartered forest and woodlands. The last time he looked up to see where he was, a rain drenched sign said "_City Limit: Philadelphia_" about an hour ago. The city lights were glowing now and it wasn't something that he believed he will ever get use to.

A whole city filled with people. Live pray.

Trying to take his mind off the impending hunger that might strike him at any given minute, Jasper continued to recite the poem that he had in his pocket. The page was ripped out from the November 30th issue of _The Saturday Review of Literature_. It was the last page the man Jasper had for dinner was reading before his precipitous death.

"_But stars were scarce in that part of the sky, and no two were of the same constellation-no one was bright enough to identify; so 'twas with not ungrateful consternation, seeing myself well lost one more, I sighed..._" At that moment, Jasper choose to sigh as the poem said that he did, even if he didn't really have to breath. The sigh did somehow make him feel but a tad bit better. This response to the unnecessary act was something that must have carried over from his time as a mortal. Finally, Jasper decided to continue as he watched a large body of angry, gray clouds roll over the early morning sky promising rain by noon, "_Where, where in Heaven am I?_" He couldn't help but chuckle at how ridiculous he must have seemed at the moment but paid no heed to the watchful eyes of the few people who were up early to open their shops for the day. They were lucky that he still had to recite the rest of the poem before he would not be able to curb his thirst.

He turned abruptly to a stray dog and in sarcastically dramatic way said, "_But don't tell me!_" The dog barked obstreperously but cowered away, as if he knew that he would be breakfast if he provoked the ruby colored eyed man anymore.

Smart dog.

Finally two hours later the edge of the inner city came into view. And yet within milliseconds, Jasper was all too aware that a sweet scent was calling out to him from the alley half a mile up the road, between the bakery and the antique bookstore. Within minutes, he was walking amongst the early morning crowd that busied themselves with Saturday morning provisions shopping. The cobblestone roads of Philadelphia was surely a different texture under his feet as he had been on solid dirt for over five months and he welcomed the unevenness it presented for him as he glided across the street and followed the delicious scent of pulsing blood. Knowing full well that he would regret (yet again) after he fed, Jasper still gave into his innate animalistic hunger, loosing all control of his rationality as he turned the corner.

The first thing that he felt as he came face to face with the dimly lit alleyway was how desolate the human felt. They felt agony and depression that could have easily parred with his own self hatred and pity. His prey was nearly begging for death to come swiftly.

And that thought made his throat burn as if he were swallowing a scorching fistful of coal and his mouth water with venom.

Finding the body in mere seconds, Jasper saw a girl no more than fifteen lying against the garbage from the night before, her entire body bloody and bruised as her tear streaked face showed years of sorrow and anguish. Finally before he could attack, the body whispered, "I am sorry sir but could you do me one small favor? Please... please kill me now. But I pray of you, put all your power into the action so I may go quickly. I am tired of the suffering this life has brought me and would not wish to linger."

Her eloquent little speech caught Jasper off guard and forced him to shoulder the weight of the distress and suffering that she was emitting. Crouching down on the balls of his feet gracefully, Jasper slowly looked into the girls eyes and felt an unnerving rush of pity for her. In a raspy voice, trying to hold out his hunger for as long as it might take for her to answer his question, "Do you know of who it is that hurt you, lil'miss?"

The girl slowly nodded her head and then said, "My father. But I do not wish ill on him. He will be judged in front of God one day, I am sure of it."

Jasper nearly scoffed at the idea that such a thing as "God" would even exists. True that he did once believe as devoutly in the religious figure as much as the next Texan man but as of late he decided that holy practices and beliefs were not his forte. If God were so gracious and forgiving and kind and loving and all that bullshit, then why was it that wars still rage on, why was it that famine and disease wrought the countryside, why was this innocent little girl being beat nearly to death by her own father... why did the existence of his kind wonder the earth?

"His name, lil'miss?" Jasper grounded out through his clenched teeth.

"William Connery." the teenage girl said before she whispered her last whisper, "Please... hurry. End the ..." the rest of her sentence disappeared in a low groan of pain.

Jasper took a deep breath letting the burn scorch his throat before stopped himself and then kept his own little promise to finish the poem first before he feasted again, "_O opening clouds, by opening on me wide. Let's let my heavenly lostness overwhelm me._ Robert Frost 1935"

And with that he sank his teeth into the young girl and draining her dry of blood in mere seconds. Pulling back from the limp form, Jasper smelled the change in the autumn air before he looked up. "The rain is early." He said quietly.

As if on cue, he watched as a single drop of water fell from the heavens above and fall upon the eye lid of the now passed on girl, rolling off her cold cheek as if it were the rain crying for her. The light drizzle came down lightly, quietly washing the blood from the girl's face. She was still so young, Jasper thought and then he whispered a prayer for her. "I hope that your God welcomes you with open arms."

With that, Jasper got up and was about to head into the local cafe to wash up his bloodied hands but decided that he was still a bit thirsty and began to head over to the local newspaper stand to see if he could get directions to Mr. William Connery's shop to pay him a visit. He could wash up afterwards if the rain let up.

* * * * * * *

Close to about an hour later, Jasper was completely sated for the moment and was soon walking down the same cobblestone street on his way out of the city but stopped abruptly in front of the cafe that he was about to go into in order to use the facilities to wash up the access blood that were stained his hands. But then he did not find the need to anymore as he took the liberty to use the restroom that the now deceased Mr. Connery provided in his quaint little basement of a house. Thus now he stands in the onset of the downpour contemplating why it was that this cafe still called for him to enter it. He had no need for it anymore and it was even more absurd for him to walk in and order a cup of tea with a side of biscuits. Yet he could not seem to push the cafe out of his mind and he knew it would nag him to no end if he did not end the curiosity before he started off East again. Jasper simply did not like the idea of yet another splinter in his mind to bug him on his next excursion thus he walked out of the rain and into the small cafe.

The room was only a third of the way full and nothing about it was stupefying or grand about it as he had imagined it would have been. It was just like any other cafe. As his eyes made it around the room to the booth at the counter, Jasper raised a eyebrow at the scent of the most tantalizing perfume.

One of his kind?

What was even more shocking was when he made a move to walk up to her, she turned her lithe, small body around and bounded towards him in graceful, dancer like steps. Her inky black hair bounced with each step she took. Jasper's eyes finally locked with hers, slamming him with shock from the innocence and intensity of such orbs. It's color alone was enough to stop him in his tracks as it seemed as though he were looking at the late afternoon sky; the color of a flaming, auburn sunset. This very much intrigued him and pulled him like gravity towards her.

"You've had me waiting for a very long time." The bells of her voice rang like a chime in Jasper's head and he did everything in his power not to succumb to the onslaught of the most delicate scent that was uniquely her. The blithe look on her face and the happiness, laced with anxiousness, pulsed off of her making Jasper feel warm from the inside.

Chuckling before saying, "I sorry about that, ma'am" Jasper was about to ask if he had met her from somewhere before, when she placed out her hand to him. Jasper quirked his head to the side in question and then slowly his eyes narrowed as he took it into his own, his large palm nearly swallowing her entire hand, fingers and all. Thinking it was merely a handshake, Jasper made a move to pull back but saw that she was already pulling him towards the door. She stopped abruptly and turned around running into Jasper's chest and he finally realizes how small she truly was as her head barely came up past his chest. Her fragrant scent engulfed his sense overpowering him so much that even a human waitress could have been walking by and Jasper would probably not have even noticed. She smiled shyly before calling out to the bartender and flipped him a quarter for her cup of coffee (which was cold and long been neglected on the counter top).

Walking into the rain again, Jasper ventured to ask what the girl's name was. She quickly answered Alice but did not ask for his... as if she already knew what it was. Like in the cafe.

Jasper did not know nor understood why it was that this young vampire's presence calmed him. But it did. He probably should inquire as to how she knew of him but didn't. He simply let her fluttering optimism cascade over him, warming his still heart.

In that few seconds, time stood still. Completely frozen and captured in a bubble was Jasper and this curious vampire. He knew then, in that frozen second, that he would gladly lay his life on the line for her. He would follow her to the ends of the earth and every ask why. He would give up everything that he was as long as he would still be by her side at the end of it all. There was something about her that called to him and could easily have brought him to his knees, completely and utterly surrendering himself in her presence.

Her presence radiated hope.


End file.
